year. The measure found practically no support. Six years later, after
the Rapid Transit Commissioners had failed under the Act of 1891, as
originally drawn, to obtain bidders for the franchise, the New York
Chamber of Commerce undertook to solve the problem by reverting to Mr.
Hewitt's idea of municipal ownership. Whether or not municipal
ownership would meet the approval of the citizens of New York could
not be determined; therefore, as a preliminary step, it was decided to
submit the question to a popular vote. An amendment to the Act of 1891
was drawn (Chapter 752 of the Laws of 1894) which provided that the
qualified electors of the city were to decide at an annual election,
by ballot, whether the rapid transit railway or railways should be
constructed by the city and at the public's expense, and be operated
under lease from the city, or should be constructed by a private
corporation under a franchise to be sold in the manner attempted
unsuccessfully, under the Act of 1891, as originally passed. At the
fall election of 1894, the electors of the city, by a very large vote,
declared against the sale of a franchise to a private corporation and
in favor of ownership by the city. Several other amendments, the
necessity for which developed as plans for the railway were worked
out, were made up to and including the session of the Legislature of
1900, but the general scheme for rapid transit may be said to have
become fixed when the electors declared in favor of municipal
ownership. The main provisions of the legislation which stood upon the
statute books as the Rapid Transit Act, when the contract was finally
executed, February 21, 1900, may be briefly summarized as follows:

(_a_) The Act was general in terms, applying to all cities in the
State having a population of over one million; it was special in
effect because New York was the only city having such a population. It
did not limit the Rapid Transit Commissioners to the building of a